


The Frayed Edge

by hyacinth_sky747



Category: Sherlock - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-04
Updated: 2012-05-04
Packaged: 2017-11-04 19:27:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/397358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hyacinth_sky747/pseuds/hyacinth_sky747
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lestrade deals with the aftermath of the fall.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Frayed Edge

John was screaming abuse at Sherlock. His fingers were fisted into the lapels of Sherlock’s coat and he was shaking Sherlock in a manner that should have left him nauseous. Sherlock was smiling. He looked overjoyed to be the undivided focus of John Watson’s ire. 

“Do you think this is a game? I watched you, Sherlock. I watched you stand on the ledge and say goodbye. I watched you die. I wanted to…I tried to say… I looked at you and—“

Sherlock’s smiled faltered. John’s words about that day battering him like punches. He brought up his hands and closed them over John’s wrists. 

Lestrade saw the blood drain from Sherlock’s face. Saw the sweat stand out on his brow before Sherlock’s legs gave at the knees. Then he was leaning heavily against John, who had stopped yelling and was sinking them both gently to the floor. 

It was, Lestrade thought, a much kinder fall. It was, perhaps, where Sherlock had always wanted to fall. 

Sherlock tried to speak. He tried to tell John the whole story but John shushed him. 

“You’re worked up. Rest. I’m sorry. I was surprised. In shock.”

“I wanted to fall into your arms.”

“Get him a glass of water, yeah?” John said and Mrs. Hudson bustled from the room. 

John held the water to Sherlock’s lips with a shaking hand. It slopped all over but some of it got in Sherlock’s mouth and he gulped it eagerly. 

Lestrade stood. He was trembling and he felt dazed but he needed to touch Sherlock. He needed to make sure he was real. He crouched down beside him and put a hand on Sherlock’s knee. 

“Sherlock. I’m sorry, mate.”

“Not now, Gregory,” Mrs. Hudson pushed him aside to coo and fuss over John and Sherlock. Molly took Lestrade’s hand and led him to the sofa. There was a sudden whirlwind of feminine comfort and tea making and tears while John sat with Sherlock’s head in his lap and Lestrade sat with his head in his hands, all three of them shell-shocked , while Molly and Mrs. Hudson put the world back together again after they had torn it apart. 

Sometime later Sherlock was sitting in his chair, with John perched on the arm of it, explaining his miracle, his deep voice made deeper by emotion. Lestrade only heard half of what he was saying. His eyes kept flickering to John’s face. John’s jaw was clenched and his Adam’s apple was working furiously. His eyes were fixed on Sherlock’s face and his fingers clenched the fabric of Sherlock’s shirt. 

“You all had to believe I was dead. Mycroft—“

John stood abruptly and looked at Mrs. Hudson. 

“Is it real?” 

Mrs. Hudson stood and Sherlock reached out to grab John’s hand. 

“Yes dear. Oh John!”

John Watson had burst spectacularly into tears. Mrs. Hudson pulled him into a hug and Sherlock sprang to his feet, wrapping his arms around both of them and resting his chin on John’s head. Molly scooted closer to Lestrade on the sofa and put her head on his shoulder. She looked up at him and her face was wet with tears but she was smiling. 

“Forgive me?” she whispered.

Lestrade smiled back. 

“Alright, to bed, no arguing. You’ve had a shock. You’ll take some of my herbal soothers.”

John’s bad leg seemed to have given up entirely. He was leaning heavily on Sherlock who seemed too dazed to hold him. Lestrade and Molly jumped to their feet, slipping themselves under John’s arms while Mrs. Hudson led Sherlock by the hand to his old room. 

Molly took care of removing John’s shoes and pulling back the covers while Mrs. Hudson settled Sherlock and took her herbal soothers from her pocket. 

“No,” John said, seeming to come back to himself a bit. He looked at Lestrade. “In the pocket of my coat.” Lestrade hurried back to the sitting room and located the prescription bottle. He fetched a glass of water.

“Give him two if he needs them,” John said, nodding at Sherlock, as he swallowed his own pills. 

“There now. You have a little rest and us three will go out for a bite to eat.”

Molly rested her hand on Sherlock’s hip and ran her fingers through John’s hair as she left. Lestrade could hear them gathering their coats and purses in the sitting room. He didn’t move. He couldn’t bring himself to. It wasn’t everyday that one saw a man return from the dead. 

“One last miracle,” Sherlock whispered. John let out a gasp and rolled toward Sherlock under the covers of the bed. Lestrade realized he might be intruding on a private moment and stepped softly from the room, pulling the door closed behind him. 

~*~

At first Lestrade thought they were holding hands. John was leaning on his cane and Sherlock was smoking as they walked slowly down the pavement. They weren’t holding hands though. John just had the cuff of Sherlock’s coat sleeve pinched between two fingers and his thumb. 

It was something Lestrade might have ribbed them about in the early days of their acquaintance. Not now. His guilt was still too strong and his friendship with both men was still raw and strained, especially with John. Sherlock seemed to have brushed off Lestrade’s betrayal as a matter of course. That hurt, but John’s stiff, polite smiles hurt him more. 

He looked away from John’s hand and forced himself to smile.

“Thanks for coming. No crime yet, I’m afraid, just a bit of a puzzle. The poor woman is rather spooked.” 

After getting sacked from the Yard Lestrade had spent a couple of months drinking and hiding from the world. He’d been drunk the morning John had kicked the door to his flat open. 

“I’m still angry and I don’t really want to be here. So you get one shot at this, Greg, then I’m done with you. Pour your drink down the sink.” 

Lestrade only hesitated a moment. In the end he got up and tossed his drink partly because he wanted to be the sort of man who deserved to associate with John Watson, and partly because he thought John might punch him if he didn’t. He was so very tired of loathing himself. 

John made him pour out every bottle of wine, spirits, and beer in the flat while he explained the purpose of his call. Mycroft, it seemed, had found him a job. It was nothing glamorous, just a low-level grunt in a government office but it would keep food on the table and a roof over his head. Lestrade was to stay sober and report for work the following the morning. 

John told him all this in a rapid-fire military debriefing sort of way. 

Lestrade nodded. “Thank you.” His voice was gruff when he said it and he turned away to hide his face. 

“Have you been drinking enough to go through withdrawal? Do you need me to stay?”

John’s voice was softer when he said this but Lestrade didn’t turn around. The humanity of John Watson made him hurt even more. He didn’t deserve it.

“I’ll be fine. You go on.”

“Greg, I know you helped—him— helped Sherlock when he was messed up. You saved him that time. I probably never would have met him if--. Listen, if you need to me stay, I’ll stay.” 

Lestrade shook his head, not trusting that his voice wouldn’t break. 

Behind him John let out a sigh and turned to go. “If you need me, call,” he said and then he was gone. Lestrade listened to the silence of his flat. He stood looking out the window for a long time and then he turned and began to pick up the pieces of his life. 

~*~

He’d started therapy and stayed sober and hung onto his job. He didn’t see John again for a few months. 

“People still call. They send emails through the blog. I should shut it down and change my number but…”

But that would be like really letting go and John wasn’t ready for that yet. Lestrade understood. 

“Anyway there’s a case. She, the client, Mary, can’t go to the police and I want to help her. I think I could if you’d assist me.” 

For a week or so it was almost like old times. Lestrade felt alive again, back in his proper element, research, surveillance, puzzling things out. John glowed, giggled, smiled with a split lip and blood dripping from his forehead at the end of the case. 

Three weeks later John and Mary were engaged. They had a small wedding ceremony. There was no best man. Well, there was. There was an empty chair next to John at the reception. John still carried scars but he had found some quiet happiness, some peace. Lestrade was glad. He was six months sober. He’d stopped calling his wife in the middle of the night. He’d stayed in therapy and last week he’d gone to Sherlock’s grave to ask for forgiveness. He couldn’t be sure but he thought Sherlock had given it. Maybe he’d just forgiven himself. 

Perhaps he would start dating again. Perhaps he could find some peace too. 

Married life suited Dr. and Mrs. Watson. They’d moved to a flat in Hampstead. Lestrade visited them for the weekend once. He welcomed the escape from his dingy flat in one of the dodgier parts of London. Mary had a dog and they spent Saturday afternoon on the heath, throwing Frisbees and laughing in the sun. The flat was, perhaps, not as charming as Baker Street. It was clean and feminine, though Sherlock’s skull did keep watch on the mantel piece, but it was homey and safe and Lestrade left it behind with a heavy heart. 

~*~

Months passed in which he knew very little of John. They’d text frequently and once John set him up on a date with one of Mary’s friends but they didn’t run in the same circles any more. The blog was quiet, the battlefield slipped further and further away and the days passed with their usual round of breakfast, work, dinner, and bed. Lestrade tried to pretend it was comforting. He tried to pretend he had found his peace.

~*~

The phone rang in the middle of the night, never a good sign, and Lestrade lurched upright in bed, calling his ex-wife’s name into the phone without checking the caller ID. 

“Lestrade? It’s Donovan. Sally Donovan.”

“Donovan? What’s going on? Is it my wife? Ex-wife? ”

“No. Greg, it’s—it’s Mary Watson. There was a collision. John Watson’s wife. I wondered if you wanted to come with when I told him. I can pick you up in five minutes.”

~*~

John was calm when they told him. He took the news with the resigned air of one who had been expecting his happiness to be stolen from him. He was in shock, of course, denial. He told Lestrade to get the whiskey out and they all had a drink, even Donovan who was on duty, even Lestrade who was eight months sober. He wasn’t worried about falling off the wagon. The whiskey tasted like bile in his throat. 

“Can I call anyone, John?” 

John shook his head. “I’ll call her family in the morning. When it’s a decent hour can you phone Mrs. Hudson for me?” 

Sally nodded. John poured another glass of whiskey and swallowed it. 

“I want to see Mary. I don’t want anyone touching her but Molly. Can you arrange that?”

~*~

Donovan drove them to the hospital. A nurse pulled Lestrade aside into a lab. Molly was waiting there. Her eyes were raw from crying. 

“I don’t know if I can see him, Greg. I did something—I can’t bear to see him.”

“His wife just died, Molly. He wants you to take care of her. You have to pull yourself together and do this. It’s John.”

Molly nodded and wiped her face with a tissue. She took a couple of deep breaths and smiled. 

“Thank you. I needed to hear that.”

She crossed to the sink and splashed her face with cold water. 

“You were in love with him? With John?”

Molly looked surprised. “No! Not him.”

“Sorry. You said you did something.”

“Oh! Just addled I suppose,” and she swept out of the room.

~*~

On the night of the funereal John showed up at Lestrade’s flat. He smelled of whiskey and was by turns, raging and bitter and numb with despair. Lestrade put him to bed on the sofa and when he woke in the morning John was gone. 

Lestrade tried to keep in touch. He wanted to be the friend John needed. He knew he was not a good enough man to fill the shoes that Sherlock had left empty, he would never be the best man, but he could be a good friend to John. 

The thing was, Lestrade understood John, he was like John, and that was their friendship’s undoing. They were both men who wanted to present a competent, calm presence to the world. They took joy in sharing their happiness but wanted to hide away their darker emotions, their perceived weaknesses. Lestrade had seen John at his most vulnerable and John couldn’t look him in the eye anymore. He couldn’t forgive Lestrade for what he saw. 

That’s why Sherlock had been good for John. Sherlock had looked at what the rest of the world would have taken for an intelligent, well-read, shell-shocked, cripple and saw a loyal, idiotic, danger slut, with two perfectly functioning legs. In Sherlock’s eyes all of John’s weaknesses became strengths, his ability to suppress messy emotions, his love of risk, and all that Sherlock perceived as weaknesses were things that John was already secure with anyway. He knew he was smart; he looked like a text book case of mental health next to Sherlock. 

Lestrade was not Sherlock. He let John go slowly, like the slow unraveling of a piece of knitting. He’d take Mrs. Hudson out for coffee now and again to enquire after John, to connect with that old part of himself that he almost didn’t recognize anymore. 

“He’s taken up with his cane again. He doesn’t say. He only meets me when he’s sitting down. It’s not fair. First the war, then poor Sherlock, and now his pretty young wife. He’s such a good man. He doesn’t deserve it.”

Only the fact that they were in a café kept Lestrade from hugging Mrs. Hudson and weeping like a child. 

So, eventually, he stopped seeing her and went back to his bleak days and bleaker nights. He bought a pint of whiskey, then another. He walked through his days in a blur. The hum of fluorescent lights, the drone of the photocopier, the blare of traffic, the silence of home, these were the music of his life. 

Until his phone meowed at him. After the Christmas with Sherlock’s orgasmic phone Molly had programmed everyone’s phone she knew to meow when she texted. His phone hadn’t meowed in quite some time. 

_Bugger off early and meet me at Baker Street at one. Love, Molly._

Lestrade really couldn’t afford to piss off his boss anymore than he already had but he didn’t care. At half past twelve he was on the street with a sandwich in his hand, headed towards his old stomping grounds.

~*~

John was there and Molly and Mrs. Hudson. Molly had a laptop open.

“This will be quite shocking,” she said. “Brace yourselves.”

She fiddled with the mouse and a video began to play. It was the roof of Saint Bart’s and Sherlock was there. Lestrade’s mouth fell open with shock when he learned that he was one of the people that Sherlock had died for and all his old guilt churned in his gut. John sat looking closed off and angry and Mrs. Hudson wept for her dear boy. It wasn’t long before Molly stopped the video. 

“I’m sorry I couldn’t show it to you earlier. He said I was only to keep it until…”

“It was safe to come back.”

Sherlock Holmes opened the door to 221B Baker Street and stepped into the room. 

~*~

Lestrade was not at all surprised that John couldn’t seem to let go of Sherlock. The man didn’t even seem to know he was doing it. He’d have his fingers looped into the belt of Sherlock’s coat, or the belt loops of his trousers, or the material of his clothing clenched into his hand. 

Lestrade was not going to mention it. He was sure Sherlock noticed it and so far as he knew Sherlock hadn’t called it to John’s attention. John would think it a weakness but Lestrade didn’t. He admired John’s devotion. He admired Sherlock for earning it. 

The months following Sherlock’s return saw Lestrade reinstated at the yard. Life began to have some color in it again. There were late nights with Sherlock whizzing through deductions, and early mornings with Sherlock hyped up on caffeine and John dozing in the corner chair of Lestrade’s office. 

Sherlock stopped smoking and one frosty morning John showed up still limping slightly, but without the cane. They were in a field with a dead body lying in frozen blood. John brought him a steaming mug of coffee.

“Ta, John.”

“I can carry two, without the cane.”

“I’m glad to see you looking better.” 

“I am better.”

“Good, John. That’s good.” 

“You’ve been a good friend, Greg. Through thick and thin.”

“I’ve been crap, John. We both know that.”

John looked out at the frozen field. The frost clung to every last blade of grass, sparkling in the sun. 

“I needed you to look away. Sherlock’s not good at looking away.”

“Sherlock’s a great man. You two make a great team.”

“We’re getting married.”

Lestrade didn’t know whether to spit out his coffee or choke on it. He decided to do a little of both. 

“That’s fantastic!”

“I was as shocked as you. Perhaps if he hadn’t died…but, it doesn’t matter. I’m in love with him. Happiness can be so brief.”

“Yeah,” Lestrade said. He put his hand on John’s shoulder. 

“We want you to be our best man.” 

It was truly awkward and embarrassing to burst into tears at this juncture but that’s what Lestrade did. John laughed and put an arm around Lestrade’s shoulder.

“You’ve always been our best man.” 

Lestrade wiped his face and hiccupped and tried to pull himself together. He was snotty and he had coffee slurped down his front but John didn’t seem to care. He smiled at Lestrade fondly.

“Molly has a crush on you.” 

Lestrade shook his head. “I’m not the guy who gets the best friend and the girl.”

John pulled Lestrade closer. “I don’t know if you’ll get the girl but you’ve got the friend, two if you count Sherlock.”

“God help us,” Lestrade said and laughed.


End file.
